Merion's minimal bunkering in 1915 and NOW: Seaview Origins

[ChipOat]

Tom MacWood,

In post #90, is that the infamous original #12 at Garden City?

[Tom MacWood]

Yes.

[Mike Cirba]

Someone very familiar with the new and improved GCGC; Connellan is the most likely candidate. I'm curious how Connellan became involved with Seaview.

Tom,

Interesting theory...I'm not sure when Connellan came on board but perhaps one of Joe's articles sheds some light.   I know he was there in January 1915 and left Seaview around October of 1915.

However, do you think it's likely that Hugh Wilson hadn't seen Travis's changes at Garden City by 1914?  Do we know when the original 12th hole at GCGC was built?

Finally, having been out there and knowing what is on these mounds, I think we're likely mislabelling them.   I think they were just sand dumped down to be covered in grass, exactly as the hole descriptions make clear.   Do  you think that the photos show the pic of the 3rd taken from behind the green?   

I have the other 17 original hole descriptions, and they clearly differentiate between sand hazards and mounding.

[Bradley Anderson]

Mike,

Here is what I have on Connellan:

1909 Clubmaker on Long Island - thats right he had a special method of gripping clubs - was he a golf professional?
        Greenkeeper at Garden City (exact dates of tenure unknown)
1912 Greenkeeper at Wykagyl/Consultant for hire – consulted for such clubs as Onwentsia, Oak Hill
1913 Rebuilds bunkers at Wykagyl after traveling abroad to study bunkering
1915 Goes to Seaview - Wilfred Reid is brought to Seaview as Golf Pro in February
1915 Works on greens at Huntington Valley
1915 leaves Seaview in October to pursue full time consulting
1916 Pipe and Oakley write an article about Connellan's sod method
1920's Reid and Connellan form a design and construction team and build/remodel golf courses in Michigan

It is possible that Connellans influence at Seaview was more than agronomic. He may have made architectural contributions too.

[Mike Cirba]

Brad,

Thanks for the info on Connellan.

Are you sure he wasn't at Seaview prior?  That photo was taken sometime prior to Feb 1915.

When was Fred Pickering at Seavew: before or after Connellan?

[TEPaul]

"Was Pickering at Seaview before or after Connellan?"


This is all I have on Pickering and Seaview and it's hard to say.


"Mr. Wilson subsequently tried him out
in the actual construction work at Seaview, and his
characteristics during his employment there were even
more pronounced than at Merion."

I just thought of it but I suppose if Hugh Wilson was trying out Pickering (AGAIN) at Seaview that certainly must mean Wilson was unquestionably the original architecture of record of Geist's Seaview. What do we have now---about seventeen confirmations of that?

[Bradley Anderson]

Are you sure he wasn't at Seaview prior?  That photo was taken sometime prior to Feb 1915.
When was Fred Pickering at Seavew: before or after Connellan?

The earliest reference to Connellan at Seaview is from January 1915 stating that he is quickly getting the greens in shape. Prior to that I have him at Wykagyl in late 1913. But I have no references for the interim time between the fall of 1913, and January of 1915 - we may assume that he was not idle thats for sure. He advertised himslef as the GRASS DOCTOR......"he is prepared to grow grass where grass never grew before." He must have been on to some good Poa. 

Pickering was doing grow-in work at Pittsburgh Field Club in June 1915 - no other references on Pickering prior to that. If he was at Seaview before Connellan it would have been a short stint, but Connellan wasn't there too long either. Pickering ended up at Myopia.

A lot of these guys back then seemed to move around a lot.

[Bradley Anderson]

Tom Paul,

I was not able to post my copy of Robert White's essay on bunker design evolution in America. But there is link to it below:

http://www.la84foundation.org/SportsLibrary/GolfIllustrated/1914/gi23g.pdf

You will see that as late as 1914 White describes the flat floor bunker as normative. Now this is only one essay of the many that were written on the subject, and it does not explicitly say that the Merion flashed sand bunkering was unique or new, but this text does add some support to that idea.

[Mike Cirba]

Brad,

Thanks for that article.   It's also interesting to hear how Robert White describes Leeds, Macdonald, and Wilson as three of a kind in terms of dictatorial approach as early as 1914, as we now know that, all that was done at Merion at that point was the basic routed layout.

White was one of the real unsung men in early golf, and someday we should try to do a thread on eveything everyone know's about him, because he was certainly widely involved on many levels.

As far as the bunkering, it does seem that what White describes was very proscriptive, but also is one of the first mentions I've seen of trying to make man-made hazards look "natural" in this country.

[Tom MacWood]

Tom,

Interesting theory...I'm not sure when Connellan came on board but perhaps one of Joe's articles sheds some light.   I know he was there in January 1915 and left Seaview around October of 1915.

However, do you think it's likely that Hugh Wilson hadn't seen Travis's changes at Garden City by 1914?  Do we know when the original 12th hole at GCGC was built?

Finally, having been out there and knowing what is on these mounds, I think we're likely mislabelling them.   I think they were just sand dumped down to be covered in grass, exactly as the hole descriptions make clear.   Do  you think that the photos show the pic of the 3rd taken from behind the green?   

I have the other 17 original hole descriptions, and they clearly differentiate between sand hazards and mounding.

GCGC's 12th was redesigned in 1906. I don't know if Wilson saw GCGC after Travis's changes or not. He never played in any event at the modernized GCGC, and I've never seen where he mentioned GCGC in any of his writing, nor did he utilize of any of its features at his other projects. Those inverted bunkers look to be the work of someone very familiar with Garden City.

It is very unlikely those are just piles of sand. That picture of the 3rd was featured in just about every article discussing the formal opening of the new Seaview (and the course had been in play for months at that point). Why would you show the picture of a half finished hole in an article like that?

Here is another hole (#4) and another picture from an article on Seaview's opening. I believe this picture confirms the feature was designed very much like those at GCGC.

[Tom MacWood]

Another possible person responsible for these features is Billy Robinson, the former pro at Atlantic City. HH Barker overhauled AC in 1909 and he was known to utilize features from GCGC. Its possible Robinson was exposed to those convex bunkers at AC.

[TEPaul]

MikeC:

I could certainly be mistaken (it's very hard to tell) but I have a feeling Robert White did not write the first part of that article posted above. I have a feeling White's contribution began after the title "The Natural Construction of Bunkers."

I'll check again, but the first part of that article might actually be Max Behr as I think he came over to Golf Illustrated as its editor or publisher right around that time.

[Tom MacWood]

Thanks for that article.   It's also interesting to hear how Robert White describes Leeds, Macdonald, and Wilson as three of a kind in terms of dictatorial approach as early as 1914, as we now know that, all that was done at Merion at that point was the basic routed layout.

White was one of the real unsung men in early golf, and someday we should try to do a thread on eveything everyone know's about him, because he was certainly widely involved on many levels.

As far as the bunkering, it does seem that what White describes was very proscriptive, but also is one of the first mentions I've seen of trying to make man-made hazards look "natural" in this country.

White wrote the second part of the article having to do with bunkers; the first part of the article was written by the editor (Max Behr).

[TEPaul]

I guess great minds think alike and just about at the same time to boot----even if I seem to have gotten there first by about 36 seconds!  

[Bradley Anderson]

And the significance of this article is: in White's diagrams, depicting the evolution of American bunkering, there are no examples of the flashed sand Merion model.

[Mike Cirba]

Tom,

Yes, I posted that picture of the 4th hole about a year ago.  

On the Donald Ross drawing he calls it a "grass mound".  

Do you think the pic of the 3rd is from behind the green as I surmised based on the background and modern photos I provided?

As far as Wilson at GCGC, I'll see what I have.   I do know a number of 1916 holes at Merion were compared to holes at GCGC in the official program, including the original 1st hole.

You'll note I'm not discounting Connellan or Robinson...I just think we need to figure out what it was intended to be before we assign authorship.

[TEPaul]

I think it's pretty illogical to assume that Hugh Wilson did not know GCGC. It certainly was reported back then that he not only made a study of courses abroad but also those in America for his on-going work at Merion et al and back then such as GCGC and Myopia were surely considered America's most significant architecture. Wilson was a guy who most certainly got around (as is evident from those agronomy letters) as well as a guy who surely knew the appropriate people in golf and in and around New York and other prominent American cities. If Hugh Wilson was not responsible for the original design of Seaview one surely does wonder why so many people reported he was back then (or failed to mention if someone else was largely responsible).

[TEPaul]

"And the significance of this article is: in White's diagrams, depicting the evolution of American bunkering, there are no examples of the flashed sand Merion model."


Brad:

White's articulation of the problems with earlier bunkers and bunker construction certainly is interesting and you're right he did not mention the idea of massively sand flashed faces (ala Merion East). He seemed more concerned about abolishing the drop-off at the incoming side of bunkers and the fact that balls would not bounce right off and over the out-going faces as he said they had with earlier bunkers (he seems to suggest that problem was solved by a form of grass "revetting" on the face of the outgoing side. He also seems to suggest that the bank on the far side of the out-going face need not be so steep and unnatural looking as the early type and style.

[Tom MacWood]

I think it's pretty illogical to assume that Hugh Wilson did not know GCGC. It certainly was reported back then that he not only made a study of courses abroad but also those in America for his on-going work at Merion et al and back then such as GCGC and Myopia were surely considered America's most significant architecture. Wilson was a guy who most certainly got around (as is evident from those agronomy letters) as well as a guy who surely knew the appropriate people in golf and in and around New York and other prominent American cities. If Hugh Wilson was not responsible for the original design of Seaview one surely does wonder why so many people reported he was back then (or failed to mention if someone else was largely responsible).

Didn't Wilson tour the golf courses of New England at some point right before or after 1911?  

What stands out to me about Seaview is the lack of mention of any designer in most articles. None of the articles reporting the opening mention who designed the golf course.

Geist must have been a difficult person to work for: the original pro Robinson was out after a couple months; his successor Wilfred Reid (brought over from the UK at great expense) lasted only a few months before he found another job; Connellan apparently only lasted a short period too. The project began sometime in the spring or early summer of 1913, and the first evidence of Wilson's involvement is Oct-Nov 1913. I wonder what was going on during the summer of 1913.  

[Bradley Anderson]

I have a lot of interesting pictures of convex inverted bunkers, but I can't figure out how to post a pic on here. Why should something so vital to this site be so darned complicated?  

Well if I had to pick an originator of all this I might go with MacKenzie. I think he devised a method of growing grass on sand mounds and then cutting away the grass in elaborate serrated patterns, to expose the sand beneath.

However I wouldn't say that the entire mound was pure sand. In the old photos I am looking at you can see a distinct cut in the approaches that essentially elevate the green. And the cut from his approaches undoubtedly went to supply the fill for these mounds all around the greens. Perhaps they were then capped with sand and planted with grass. And then after the grass grew in they cut the grass away to expose the sand?

I have a picture of MacKenzie standing on one of these mounds admiring it, and I just can not imagine how that could have been built any other way than with grassing the sand and then peeling the grass away to expose the sand below.

[Bradley Anderson]

Geist must have been a difficult person to work for: the original pro Robinson was out after a couple months; his successor Wilfred Reid lasted only a few months before he left; Connellan apparently only lasted a short period too. The project began sometime in the spring or early summer of 1913, and the first evidence of Wilson's involvement is Oct-Nov 1913. I wonder what was going on during the summer of 1913. 

Mr. MacWood,

I think you are right about that. He had gravel roads on every hole so that he could have a car follow him around when he played. There are indicators that he was an odd dude. And that makes it difficult to know who was responsible for what out there.

May I say that my fascination with Seaview is because Reid & Connellan remodeled my golf course, and Seaview is where those two first met and worked together, albiet for a very brief time.

[Tom MacWood]

Tom,

Yes, I posted that picture of the 4th hole about a year ago.  

On the Donald Ross drawing he calls it a "grass mound".  

Do you think the pic of the 3rd is from behind the green as I surmised based on the background and modern photos I provided?

As far as Wilson at GCGC, I'll see what I have.   I do know a number of 1916 holes at Merion were compared to holes at GCGC in the official program, including the original 1st hole.

You'll note I'm not discounting Connellan or Robinson...I just think we need to figure out what it was intended to be before we assign authorship.

In some of his notes Ross also mentions sand mounds, so they apparently were a feature of the golf course.

[Mike Cirba]

I’m not sure any of this is quite as mysterious as we’re making it.   The timeline seems pretty clear to me.

Sometime in spring of 1913, shortly after Merion East opened for play the previous fall, construction on Seaview began.    By autumn of that year, probably right after seeding, very knowledgeable Philadelphia golf writer William Evans wrote;



By the next summer of 1914 the course was opened for member play, but because owner Clarence Geist was suffering for months with a case of “the Grip”, official opening of Seaview was delayed until January 1915.

Still, that didn’t prevent early reports from surfacing.

In October 1914, an article appeared detailing the course, complete with an overview routing map and hole by hole descriptions of the golf course that Hugh Wilson designed and built for Clarence Geist.

Following is the drawing of the routing, as well as a modern aerial.   The routing is exactly the same as the course that opened in 1914.





The course was pretty cool, with vast sandy stretches, as this 1920s aerial demonstrates;




Following are the hole descriptions of the Hugh Wilson design for Clarence Geist that opened in 1914.   Today’s holes beginning at #9 are presently numbered differently today than they were in 1914.

Each 1914 description is followed by the modern yardage book hole description.



























































































I’d also mention that the old photos that were posted were taken no later than January 1915.   The picture of the 3rd, in my opinion, is clearly taken from behind the green, showing the mounding there (that still exists today) or the clubhouse would be easily visible in the photo.

There is no doubt that sometime around or just after the course opening that Wilfred Reid, William Connellan, and Donald Ross were all employed by Clarence Geist.

Reid was the pro and stayed on for about 9 months.   Connellan was the Superintendent/Greenkeeper and was there until the fall of 1915, likely following Fred Pickering who Wilson probably used initially.   Ross came in the spring of 1915 to ”stiffen” the bunkering and although his drawings and suggestions are on the display in the clubhouse, only some of this recommendations were actually followed.  

It’s likely with American’s imminent involvement in WWI, as well as Geist’s dream project cost overruns (as well as his new Florida projects), the course at Seaview never changed very much from what was originally built.

I do have to wonder, if the architect involved was virtually anyone but Hugh Wilson, with the number of different newspaper accounts pre and post-course opening crediting him and ONLY him with the design of the golf course, as well as his own letters to Piper & Oakley stating his involvement, whether we'd even be having this discussion.

I frankly can't think of many courses of this vintage with clearer documentation.

[TEPaul]

"I’m not sure any of this is quite as mysterious as we’re making it."


Mike:

Who exactly is making this mysterious? I think I've done a pretty good job of following this thread and I've known a lot about the history of Seaview for a long time. What is so mysterious about it?

[Mike Cirba]

"I’m not sure any of this is quite as mysterious as we’re making it."


Mike:

Who exactly is making this mysterious? I think I've done a pretty good job of following this thread and I've known a lot about the history of Seaview for a long time. What is so mysterious about it?

Tom,

Let's just say that there's been speculation whether some of the features in photos taken by January 1915 were actually Hugh Wilson, when reports from October 1914 made clear he was the architect.  

For instance, Tom MacWood speculated that those features could have been William Connellan, it could have been William Robinson, it could have been anyone but the person actually credited just 2 months before with the entire design, and the only person contemporaneously credited with the design.    

I think one mistake we sometimes make in looking at old photos is somehow imagining that pics taken at a course opening mean the same thing as we see today at opening.   For instance, we know full well from the many accounts of the time that the whole purposeful idea was to open a course in a pretty unfinished state and then watch play for some time and then add/subtract or revise features in direct response to that play in an attempt to make the course better as a planned evolutionary process.

I'll be honest here.

Earlier on this thread there was a picture produced of the original 12th at Garden City, which has achieved hallowed iconic status on this discussion group.   Honestly Tom, if it looked anything like that from the ground level I can see why they blew it up!       Holy "amateurish" Batman!!  



I love Walter Travis's work, but to suggest that what was built at Seaview was some type of homage to the convex bunkering at inland Garden City I think is a serious stretch.    The winds at seaside Seaview would have quickly reduced such piles to sand dispersions and anyone spending two days on the property would have quickly realized that.

We have clear documentation from Wilson in his own words that they were taking sandy silt from the bay and didn't know what to do with it so they were putting it into piles and trying to desalinate it.   Today's Seaview course features piles of mounding literally all over the place.

We also have clear documentation that more pits, bunkers, and other design features would be added much like Merion and other courses of the time after closely observing play and then determining what would work best.

To then look at a picture from official opening day taken by Tillinghast in January 1915 and thinking we're looking at a mature, finished product based on the mounding done at Garden City is speculative to say the least.

To then suggest it had to have been done by anybody but Hugh Wilson is just....beyond revisionist history without anything further to bolster that claim, it seems to me.

I'm all for discussing architectural history, and even speculating because I think that's important as some of this stuff is open to interpretation...

but, to completely discount Wilson's talents and achievements as is constantly done by some on here does get to be a bit strange, to say the least.